


Broken Pieces

by Anonymous



Category: 9-1-1: Lone Star (TV 2020)
Genre: !!! This is a modified reposted work from an old account of mine !!!!, 1x08, Angst, Blood, Gen, Gunshot Wounds, How Do I Tag, Hurt, Hurt TK Strand, I Wrote This Instead of Sleeping, I should've put this in the tags when I posted but I honestly didn't think it'd be a problem, I'm Sorry, Owen Strand is trying, no beta we die like men
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-30
Updated: 2020-07-30
Packaged: 2021-03-06 01:15:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,922
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25604938
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/
Summary: The realization hits him hard as he lets out another stream of bile. His son was shot. His son stopped breathing. While vomiting onto the pavement on a chilly Austin night, Owen realizes he might just lose his only child.xxOwen's POV of the events that happen after TK gets shot
Relationships: Carlos Reyes & Owen Strand, Carlos Reyes/TK Strand, Michelle Blake & Owen Strand, Owen Strand & TK Strand
Comments: 13
Kudos: 110
Collections: Anonymous





	Broken Pieces

“TK Strand, twenty-six, GSW to the chest with a possible hemopneumothorax.” Michelle jumps out of the ambulance, relaying the events to the doctor that came out to meet them.

Owen knows that the doctors are calling out orders and directing them where to go, but he can’t hear any of it. The only thing that survives in his mind is the knowledge that his son stopped breathing. Michelle had to intubate him. Owen watched the fear in TK’s eyes, watched him panic and struggle for breath, and promised him that he’d be fine. That he’d be okay. And then his son stopped breathing.

He stops the doctor right before he crosses the red line that says authorized personnel only. He’s aware of how frantic and panicky his voice sounds, but he doesn’t care. “You can’t give him opioids. He’s an addict… you can’t…” 

Owen needs to make sure that they know that. He knows how upset TK would be to find out he’d taken something, especially without knowing it.

“We’ll make sure of it.” The doctor nods, taking in Owen’s terrified appearance. “Sir, we’re going to do everything we can for your son.” Then, the doctor’s running off. Following the gurney through the double doors and down the hallway.

Owen does the hardest thing he’s ever had to do in his life. He stops, and he trusts the doctors to save his son. He steps back, away from the thick red line on the floor, and puts the life of his only child into the hands of a complete stranger.

It’s only now, when Owen is left in the hallway, that the distractions of the emergency room come flying at him in full force. The fluorescent lights are too bright and the sirens of other approaching ambulances too loud. There’s a kid screaming in a bed nearby, a middle-aged woman projectile vomiting into a plastic bucket. It’s everything all at once, but Owen’s focus is on one thing. His attention drawn the the red on his hands. The blood that coats his fingers and has already started drying under his fingernails.

TK’s blood.

He doesn’t know how he ends up outside or how Michelle’s hand ends up rubbing soothing circles on his back. All Owen knows is that he’s violently puking his guts out in the ambulance bay.

The realization hits him hard as he lets out another stream of bile. His son was shot. His son stopped breathing. While vomiting onto the pavement on a chilly Austin night, Owen realizes he might just lose his only child.

◊◊◊

Pink water swirls around endlessly before disappearing down the drain. Owen’s been in here for ten minutes already, scrubbing his hands relentlessly. All of the blood’s gone now, but he can still feel it. It’s still sticky between his fingers, and he wants it off. The blood should be in TK’s body, not stuck underneath Owen’s fingernails. He scrubs his hands until they’re red and burning, and only then is he sure that all of it has gone down the drain.

Michelle is waiting for him when he walks out. She takes notice of his hands immediately and looks them over. “Owen…”

“I couldn’t… I couldn’t have it on my hands, Michelle.”

“Okay.” She just nods, dropping his hands and the subject. “I have to finish my shift, are you going to be okay here by yourself?”

Owen knows he can’t break if he’s got an audience and, god, does he just want to break. Wants to let himself shatter into pieces. He takes a shaky breath and nods, “Yeah…. yeah, I’ll uh… I’ll be fine. I’ve… I’ve got to call his mother…”

Michelle says a few more things, but Owen can’t hear here. He barely even feels it when she pulls him into a hug and squeezes tight. Everything is muffled and he feels like gasping for air. Owen wonders if this is what drowning feels like.

He watches Michelle go. Watches as she meets up with Tim and says a few words to him before jumping back into the ambulance. Headed off to the next disaster that needs her.

Once the ambulance is out of sight, Owen lets out the first sob. In the waiting room, feeling completely alone, he lets himself go.

◊◊◊

“Pick up. Pick up. Pick up.” Owen mutters it as he listens to the phone ring.

The ringing stops abruptly after the fifth ring. “Hi, you’ve reached Gwyneth Strand. I am currently unable to answer your call, please leave your name and number, and I will get back to you. Thanks, bye.”

He doesn’t knows how he should feel about the fact that Gwen never changed her name back, about the fact that she kept Strand. Owen still doesn’t know why she did. He still loves his ex-wife, even if they don’t get along very well anymore. Part of him will always love her; she’s the mother of his only child.

He keeps calling; listening to the long distance spiel before he’s even able to hear the phone ring. Growling when all he gets is voicemail time and time again. He can’t just leave her a message. No, Owen owes her an actual conversation.

He dials a fifth time, almost crying when he hears his ex-wife’s voice. “Hello?”

“Gwen, it’s Owen…”

“What happened?” It doesn’t surprise him that she can guess the reason he’s calling. Owen doesn’t call her very often. Maybe once a month to talk about TK and life, on her birthday, and whenever TK’s been hurt.

“We… uh… we were responding to a cardiac event behind a locked door…” Owen turns to get control of his voice and his breathing. “TK had the battering ram and busted the door open… a seven-year-old on the other side got scared and… he uh… he shot him.”

There’s a silence on the line for a few seconds. “What?”

“TK was shot.” Just saying that out loud put Owen right back in that hallway. Catching TK’s fall as the kid’s legs gave out from underneath him. Running a hand through TK’s hair, trying to reassure him, while keeping the other one firmly pressed against his wound. Seeing how much blood there was when they got him onto the gurney… watching him stop breathing…

Owen relays all of it to Gwen, from the moment the gun went off to the moment TK was taken out of his sight. She doesn’t stop asking questions. Why didn’t they know there was a gun? Why was TK the first one through the door? Why didn’t you identify yourselves? If you identified yourselves, why would the kid have been scared enough to shoot someone? What did the bullet hit? How much blood has he lost? Is he going to be okay? Some he can answer, but most he can’t. He tells her they’ll have to wait until their kid is out of surgery.

They sit in silence as they wait for the doctor, still on the phone with each other. Unsaid accusations and resentment linger in the air. Gwen blames Owen for this, she does. Just not as much as Owen blames himself.

◊◊◊

Brain Damage. His son might have permanent brain damage because of the two-minutes he spent without any oxygen. Owen can’t get it out of his head. Permanent brain damage. Hypovolemic shock. The beginning of organ failure… And they were lucky. All of that, and the doctors say that TK got lucky.

They don’t even know if he’s going to wake up, but that doesn’t matter. According to the doctors, he’s lucky to even be alive.

Gwen now directs her questions to the doctor, acting more like she’s in a courtroom than in a hospital. Part of Owen is thankful she’s turned her attention on him instead, and he all but checks out of the conversation.

His child—his only child—is lucky to be alive and the last question Gwen wants answered floats silently and unanswered in the air. Why didn’t you protect him?

◊◊◊

Owen Strand isn’t a god fearing man.

He used to be, but then 2,977 people died at the world trade centre. 343 firefighters lost their lives; 14 of them were from his station. A man Owen thought of as a brother, a boy barely out of high school he treated like a son… his family.

Owen hasn’t done this since 9/11, but yet the sting of his knees against the floor feels familiar. So does the way he’s got his hands clasped tightly together and his head bowed. Even his silent plea that everything will be okay reminds him of another time sitting in the front of a fire truck.

Tonight he kneels and he prays for his son. He begs whatever’s up there—if there even is someone up there—to please let him wake up. To let TK wake up and be okay.

Owen needs his son to be okay.

He kneels and he prays and he looks for peace on a night when all he wants to do is scream. 

◊◊◊

It takes Owen all of three seconds to realize that Officer Reyes isn’t here in a professional capacity. TK’s been smiling a lot more lately, ever since that night he came home from the club with Paul. He’s also rarely been home, ducking out after shift to go out with a friend. From the way the officer is standing—eyes red and starring past Owen at TK—it’s obvious that officer Reyes is that friend. Probably more than friends.

His assumption that they are more than friends is confirmed when becomes back into the room to see Carlos in his vacated chair by TK’s bed, holding his hand. As soon as he notices Owen in the doorway he gets up. “Sir… uh… I’m gonna… I’m gonna go…”

Owen just shakes his head, “You can stay. I’m not going to kick you out.” 

“Thank you.” His answer isn’t louder than a whisper. The officer moves to the chair on the other side of the bed, leaving Owen the closer chair.

He nods, taking the now empty chair. TK looks too still in the hospital bed. He’s always been fidgety, ever since he was a baby. He could never sit still, something was always moving. He couldn’t sleep still either. Owen remembers going to wake the kid up in the mornings before school, TK spread out weirdly with his blankets tangles around him. He’s still like that, Owen hears him shifting around beside him when they’ve got an overnight shift. It never fails to make him smile. Now, TK’s still in the hospital bed, and it terrifies him.

Owen’s not exactly sure what’s been going on between the officer and his son and, though he wants to know, he’s not going to ask. It feels wrong to talk about TK while he’s still in the room, even if he can’t hear or see them. Owen might not know exactly what’s going on between them, but he knows there is something. The kid looks almost as torn up and upset as Owen does. He’ll ask TK when he wakes up, and for now, he’ll let Carlos stay.

“He’s gonna be okay…” Owen assures softly, but it’s with sudden heartbreak that he realizes—after remembering a night picking up his sobbing child on the side of a bridge, after mulling over an overdose that seems less and less like an accident, after thinking about the years of struggle and heartbreak—he realizes he doesn’t really believe himself.

**Author's Note:**

> So, that was me experimenting with something I wrote so long ago. I added to it, read it over once, and put it top here. Leave a comment if you liked it, or want to correct a spelling mistake or something. 
> 
> Thanks for reading.
> 
> Edit: For anyone who feels like this is familiar, I posted it on an old account in June. I deleted the account and all subsequent works on it because I was going through some stuff. I still had the draft on my computer and decided to fix it up and repost it anonymously. (Cause I'm not really getting back into fan fiction permanently.)


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